Turning Scarlett
by FountainPenguin
Summary: Max and Scarlett have some loose ends to tie up as they embark on a search for the other eliminated contestants following their double elimination. Well, perhaps in Max's case, he has some tight ends to loosen. And Scarlett has a repertoire of fiery words to spit at him as he does it. (Written July 2014)


Max reached the zenith of his arc a full second and a half before I did, which was impressive for someone of his body type. He rotated a vertical 180° as terminal velocity set in, so he was looking up at me - flapping like a downed mallard, mouth brimming with fluffy marshmallows, eyes so wide I could see the reflection of stars in his dark blue irises even without my glasses on - when we hit the spruce tree.

By some lucky shift of fate, Max's flailing hand caught a firm hold among the leaves. I, with my arms tied straight against my sides, wasn't nearly as fortunate. Needles stabbed my nose and slashed across my legs. Splinters of bark plunged into my cheeks and crackled like fire as they scraped together. I tasted my stomach flipping into my throat, and my plummet jerked to an abrupt halt when the back of my sweater snagged on a branch and held.

For a moment, I didn't move. I didn't blink, and I didn't breathe.

"Scarlett?"

Stomach acid boiled on my tongue and made me gag. I swallowed to force long-expired horse meat back down my throat. I shut my eyes hard, then opened them and regretted it. A long, spidery twig clawed out at me like a desperate hand from the branch below. My eyelashes brushed against its tip when I blinked again.

"Scarlett?"

Leaves showered before me like snowdust as Max, belly up, came inching down a long branch like a three-toed sloth on a sugar rush. He stopped a meter above my head with his legs tangled in a criss-cross around his branch. Then he dropped, arms outstretched, to dangle his hands centimeters from my nose.

"Scarlett, look. I'm bleeding from my finger ouchies."

I should have snapped at him. I should have bitten his fingers off at the knuckles. I should have screamed to startle him and watch him plunge twenty or so yards to the ground below.

Instead,

"What exactly is the oxygen level in your blood, and why is it _blue_?"

Max looked at his fingertip, then rubbed a sapphire smear across his chest. "Oh. That. _That_ was an unfortunate lab accident involving icky, squishy fruit and a sharp-teethed electric eel that we won't be talking about again. It affected all but what goes into my eyes, and don't ask me why. Look, I can make it glow in the dark when I squint and turn my head like this."

"It… glows in the dark?" My own blood trickled an arch down my lip, but I couldn't move my hand to scrub it away. I rubbed a shoulder against my ear in case there were spruce needles caught in my hair. The ropes squeezed against my chest. Chef had been careful to tie them both above and below my elbows, effectively preventing me from moving my joints at all. When I squirmed, the branch that had snagged my sweater made a squeaking noise like a spiteful cat.

Max bobbed his head. "I was trying to install plant cells in my skin so I could turn sunlight into food like the apple trees do. Mother was making sukiyaki that night." He grimaced then and folded the ends of his sleeves over his hands. "I must admit that it looks rather cool, but it tingles and itches badly in the air and I get cold _much_ too easily now. Mother hit the roof when she saw it, and then she made me eat the sukiyaki anyway. Blech."

With a few grunts and heaves, Max returned himself to his perch on the branch. I heard him curse at the tree more than once. He reappeared in my left eye's line of sight a moment later, this time clinging with his hands like a chimpanzee rather than trying to use his legs.

"You are extremely lucky those wretched fiends stuffed me in the cannon with you. If _I_ weren't around to unstick you, Scarlett, then there's really no telling how long you'd be stuck up in this nasty tree. True, it's entirely because of you that I'm out here with no remaining shot at the one million dollars… But I forgive you. I've read the books, and unfortunately holding grudges always leads to the downfall of the _truly_ evil."

Max stared down the spruce trunk. His legs swayed. He dropped a glob of spit, which vanished in the dark before I saw it hit the ground. Then, finally deciding that a slender, mossy branch beneath his feet would hold his weight, Max let go.

He almost missed, and slammed against it with his leg twisted at an awkward angle. His face contorted in a silent screech. The new branch dipped like the trunk of a _loxodonta africana_ , but it didn't snap. Cradling the back of his knee with one hand, Max used the other to drag himself in my direction, scoot by scoot.

"Let me get this straight. You _accidentally_ turned your blood cells phosphorescent?"

"One man's accident can still be used for EVIL, silly girl. I once filled an entire lava lamp with the stuff when Father hosted our city's charity blood drive. Though if you think that's impressive, you should've seen the chair I made from my solidified tears. Took me four months of grueling work and then a few visits to the ophthalmologist to flip my vision right-side-up again, but it was well worth it."

I blinked twice. Hard.

Max tipped his head to the left and scrutinized me from dark red hair to dirty green shoes. Then he wiped his mouth with his sleeve and reached a hand towards me.

"So, Scarlett, as I was saying, in just a moment I'll have you back on solid ground and we can- Ooh, lookie here. Could it be? It is! Split a marshmallow with me?"

It was sticky, dusted with dirt and a swirl of…

Was that my _hair_?

I shuddered a 'No', so Max shrugged and popped the sickening thing in his mouth, _pilus_ and all. Sugary froth dribbled from the corner of his lip. His tongue darted out to dab at it, then swept up to clean the inside of his nose, like a giraffe.

His blood was luminous, his hair dark violet, he had the intelligence of a turkey and the mannerisms of a Tasmanian devil, all wrapped into a single garden-gnome-sized package. Even when he wasn't speaking, Max had a way of being the most irksome individual on the entire island.

"You may untie me now, Max." I said. "Unless you're expecting to receive a written invitation."

He laughed.

He actually _laughed_.

I had heard Max cackle before. Ever since our arrival he had been working on one that, and I quote, 'Could fill the souls of a thousand wolves with shrinking terror as they realize Max (Insert evil super villain name here) has arrived, mwahahaha'.

This was something else. Not a cackle, not a chuckle. Just a flat-out, honest-to-goodness shoulder-shaking belly laugh that nearly knocked him from his branch to the ground far below. A pair of silver owls shot from a neighboring fir, their wings flashing white above our heads. The bleat of an _alces alces_ rolled down from the next hill. I squinted and scrunched in my toes, a vain attempt at shutting out the demeaning noise. My skin burned where the ropes cut into my chest.

Max coughed, ending his laugh on a scratchy note, and clasped the branch with two fat fists. "No," he said, "No, I don't think I will. How unclever do you really think I am, Scarlett? Maxie didn't just sprout out of the pickle patch."

I shook my head, regretting it immediately when my thin branch made an ominous cracking sound. "It would seem he didn't, or he would be well aware that pickles are a precipitate of preserving cucumbers in vinegar and do not, in fact, sprout from underground. Now I would very much appreciate it if you would stop playing games and loosen these ropes, or so help me I will _drown_ you in the lake the instant I get down."

Dirty twigs and insect-munched leaves had snagged in his hair. Was my hair the same way? The back of my neck tingled with an itch I had no chance to reach.

"Without any water wings."

Max crossed his own arms, just because he knew it would annoy me. "I'll get you to the downside of the tree, Scarlett, but I absolutely re _fuse_ to cut off those ropes. Not until you apologize for sending that flea-ridden robot after me. Do you know what that beast did to my underwear?"

"You wax more diabolical with every passing day. Even for an arch-villain, isn't demanding an apology asking a particle much?"

"And also you have to pinkie-pinkie-thumb swear never to do it again."

Apologies, promises- it sounded like a child's game. The itch on my neck grew more insistent. My chest burned moreso. I kicked my legs, trying to allow my lungs to expand, but was rewarded with nothing more than another crack of my branch. I didn't like how I couldn't see the base of the tree from where I dangled.

"Max," I said, "If you don't untie me _this nanosecond_ , Scuba Bear is going to look like one of Ella's stuffed _rabbits_ ' stuffed rabbits compared to me. Now. Get. Me. _Down_!"

It was difficult to make out as he shifted on his branch, but Max's brows seemed to pinch together. He pulled in his lower lip like he was suddenly having second thoughts.

My branch swayed again in a warm breeze. With a groan that said, _I just know I'm going to regret this_ , Max unfolded his arms.

"All right, Scarlett, I forgive you. No apology necessary. I'll even let you be my sidekick again, but that's my final offer."

"Your _SIDEKICK_?"

I side-kicked, all right. I side-kicked hard in Max's direction, hoping to maybe catch him in the face - or better yet, in the groin - and watch him as he fell. But in my rage and the dark and with my glasses still lying broken on the floor back in the island's control room, I misjudged the distance. My foot swung too high and, with the ripping of fabric and a mighty snap, my branch gave way.

I fell. I tumbled. I plunged. My anger drained like the insides of a gutted fish, snapping to panic as needle-point leaves whipped past my face. I slammed against a branch stomach-down, then cracked my head against another when I slipped again. I saw the stars. I tasted blood. Max howled my name.

Then I crashed to earth in a heap. Face-first, then chest, my legs crooked in the air behind me like a checkmark. Congrats on surviving, you get an A+ and a gold star. When I twitched my fingers I heard more pops than one.

"Minion, are you alive? Hang on, I'm coming! Just a… quick second! Oof! I'm on my- What the-? _Rats_?"

I rolled clods of dirt in my mouth until I had enough saliva to spit them out, along with the blood that had accumulated after biting my tongue. My entire lower jaw tingled. So did my chest, but at least I could breathe again. I opened my eyes.

"Ow!" wailed Max from above. "Two against one? Hardly fair! Unhand me, you dastardly winged vermin!"

I… couldn't… see.

The world was black. Just black.

No. No, this wasn't happening. I hadn't gone blind from that fall. It wasn't that high!

Maybe I could fix it. If I inserted a microchip in my retina…

No, constructing one of those would require the use of my sight.

Maybe with the eyes of a… No. Maybe some wires… Or another fall…

Maybe Max? As much as he made my skin crawl (And it really was crawling just at the thought), anyone who could turn his blood blue might be more useful than he first appeared.

Or maybe I could simply scoot away from the dirt heap like an inchworm in reverse. That could work too. Crisis averted.

"I said, let _go_ , disgusting things! Or I'll- _AUGH_! Ow, ow! Pain! Sidekick, the bats are chewing my hand to an icky pulp!"

With a grunt and a squirm, I flopped over in time to watch Max hit the ground back-first a meter away. For a few seconds he kicked his arms and legs in the air like an overturned ladybug. His fingers shone like glow worms. Fluorescent blue blood trickled across his thumb, down his wrist. Droplets spattered the leaf mulch beside his ear.

"Ah- ah- pff. Yuck. Foul creature! I will exact my revenge on you soon enough! You, and all the rest of this wretched island! _Bwahahahaha_!"

"Cut it out, Vermin. You sound like a bull moose staking out its territory, and you wouldn't be the only _alces alces_ in the area."

That shut him up. Most likely his stream of consciousness had brought him back to our first day on the island, when the entire herd had charged him. I know I was replaying that golden scene in _my_ mind.

"Scarlett," Max said. He wiped his face with one sleeve, leaving a cerulean streak across his forehead. "There's a, um…"

I chose to ignore him. Thick tree roots coiled across the ground, snarling together like a den of rattlesnakes during hibernation. I put my head on one, then my shoulders. Pulling myself into a sitting position with two hands tied wasn't easy, but I managed. My skin crawled from my stomach to my scalp. Now, if I only had a sharp stick I could wedge beneath the-

"Scarlett," Max said again, sounding more agitated this time. "Your face, it's…"

I looked down.

Hundreds-

Tiny-

Red-

" _Fire ants_!"

But the really scary part?

"Why are they here? On an island? In _Canada_?"

Specifically, an island where anything with 'fire' in its name could legitimately mean _fire_.

"Do _some_ thing, you useless toenail of an ignoramus. They're everywhere!"

The little weasel had taken shelter behind a rock after my first shout. He crouched on his stomach with his hands wrapped around his head like he was expecting a tornado to come tearing through the trees, rather than fresh waves of red ants. I suppose I wouldn't take kindly to someone destroying my house with their face either.

"Have the nasty things crawled through your ears and started sucking out your brain?" Max screamed back. "I'll get your arms free and you'll leave me behind for killer ant food! I know your evil scheme, Minion, and I'm not getting tricked by it. _Eek_ \- Ah, shoo, shoo, bats! She's the one you want, not me!"

Their legs scurried through my sleeves. Chills raced down my nervous system.

"If you won't untie me, drag me to safety at the very least. I wouldn't leave _you_ for fire ants."

"But apparently leaving me for a crocodile is fair game!"

I kicked at a dense patch of ants and flared my nostrils. "Animatronic reptiles during the game and a live swarm of _solenopsis_ post our elimination are two completely different scenarios."

An ant on my knee closed its pincers over my skin and plunged in its stinger. One on my arm did the same. I smashed my shoulder against the tree, killing maybe two or three of them, but there were still more… so many more…

"Max, the lake! Down there, past those pines! We can drown them in the lake!"

He was still shaking crimson insects and periwinkle blood from his hand. "First I want my apology, Sidekick! Call me Master Maxwell, your supreme evil overlord for life!"

They were crawling on my neck, down my sweater, near my ears.

 _It's all in your head_ , I told myself. _It's all in your head. Keep it together, Scarlett._

And then they were in my hair.

"Crap," I began, and launched into a few less-controlled expletives as I smashed ants with my elbows and knees. "Get them out of my hair, get them out of my hair!"

"But Sidekick, you-"

"I WANT THEM _OUT_!"

Max didn't say anything else. He leapt over his boulder and ran towards me, smashing ants beneath his sneakers. With a movement as fluid as any on television he scooped me up, tossed me over his left shoulder, and took off running for the water.

They were on my scalp. They were on my scalp. I could feel their tiny legs, their clicking mandibles, their jabbing stingers.

"And of course there would be a cliff," Max grumbled, shoving me higher up his shoulder. "Heaven forbid we should come on this stinky show and not jump off a cliff."

"Max, wait! The ropes!"

"The what now?"

"I can't _swim_!"

We went under. Desperate ants lost their grip on me and swirled away, vanishing forever in the current.

As it turned out, I didn't need to worry about drowning. My bonds loosened as soon as they came in contact with the water. I popped out first one arm, then the other. The ropes sank down in the dark and disappeared. I swear a long pink tentacle pulled them through a crack between the rocks.

Then I rounded on Max. His eyes went wide. He spouted bubbles and garbled words, backpedaling his arms like wind turbines in a storm. But he was clumsy in the water, and I caught up to him easily.

"Sure!" he bubbled, jabbing a finger at me. "Sure, sure, sure!" That used up his air. He struck for the surface, kicking frantically, but I grabbed his foot to hold him down. It would only be a matter of time.

"Shirk!" Max screamed. This time he pointed behind me.

Shirk?

I didn't even get the chance to turn full around before a certain large something coated with tough dermal denticles slammed into me. I slammed into Max, and both of us slammed into the rocks when we came down from the air.

Max gasped. He hacked water, along with a few ants, onto the pebbles between his hands. He kept moaning the word "Why?" over and over again, sometimes including "Shark" and "Drown" and "Tummy twisting".

I bent over alongside him, my forearms shaking as I breathed. "The urge to drown you was just stronger than me, Max. You understand."

He groaned and flopped face-down into the water he had just spit up. I sat back on my knees and scrubbed my scalp with both hands. Two lucky ants had survived the swim. I crushed them between my pointer finger and thumb. Thank goodness, the rest were gone. My heartbeat evened out again.

"And speaking of strength," I continued, taking a fistful of my hair, "your triceps are far denser than your body weight would suggest, particularly after one takes your dietary and exercise habits into account. Let me guess: A lab accident involving rats and rabbits resulted in an abnormal amount of myocytes in your arms?"

"Well, I do take French horn lessons. Holding those big things is tricky. There's more to my off-time than just the babysitting thing." Max sat up again. He tilted his head and proceeded to slap his left ear until water spurted from the right. "So Scarlett, about those ants back there…"

I slitted my eyes at him. "Go a year with head lice as an eight-year-old, let your brother pretend to pull them all out, continually wake up to find blood smeared across your pillow with eggs and legs mushed in your hair, finally burn it all and your house to cinders, and then come talk to me."

I swear, Max had more blue on his shirt than gray now. As I wrung out my hair, he wrapped one sleeve around his fist. The stain oozed down his arm.

"I've never been bitten by a vampire bat before, you know. Just look at how _evil_ it is. And soon, its evil powers will seep through my blood and into my brain. Then I, Maxwell Zambar, shall be crowned ruler over all vampires on the island! _Bwahahaha-_!"

"Unless you die first."

"You think it was carrying rabies?"

"Sure." I twisted my hair, soaking my skirt in the process. "That's it. In which case it would have been clumsy and had difficulty propelling itself in its typical aerodynamic fashion."

Max looked again at his hand and held it out as far from his body as possible. Which, in case you were wondering, wasn't very far at all. "No matter. After ingesting the supersaturated amount of electrolytes in my blood, I don't think they will be around much longer."

"Or they could reproduce and Canada will be swarmed by colonies of phosphorescent _desmodus rotundus_."

"That," said Max, grinning a wicked grin, "would be a brilliant idea. I really don't know how you come up with these things, Scarlett. You know, if you are ever in need of a place to stay or something to put on your evil résumé, you can always come crawling back to being my- "

Before I had the chance to tackle him back into the lake, someone shouted Max's name. I froze, my thick hair bunched in my fists.

"That's Max all right! Yo Max! Yoo-hoo! Over here! And… Huh. Who is that out there with him? Jasmine? Hey guys, come see- No, stop, wait! Turn it off, turn it off!"

"Is that a-?" I began.

"Evil battleship?" Max finished.

"Houseboat," I corrected. Squinting, I scratched an ant bite on my calf. "Well. Perhaps it is a battleship in shape. Chris mentioned something about a battleship once, if I recall correctly. During… Amy's elimination? Rodney's? Well. It's much too low for it to be an actual battleship in these shallow waters, and that appears to be an open door on the front deck, I think, which certainly wouldn't be present if this were really such a ship. I believe I will stick with the description 'houseboat'. Hold on a moment. Those colors, was that-? It _can't_ be."

" _Obviously_ you lack the advanced eyesight of an eagle that I possess." Max curled his lip. "Curses. It's that pointy-haired, sucking-up buffoon with the carrot for a microphone. If he thinks I'm going anywhere near- Wait. Do I smell chicken?"

Until he said the word, I had forgotten how hungry I was. I suppose island-wide domination will do that to you. My stomach released a sickly gurgle. I inhaled deeply once, then again. "Oranges. Pineapple. Cinnamon."

"Pizza. Tuna fish. Hamburgers. Those little flat cakes with the sugar and syrup on top."

" _Peanut butter_."

We shared a look of longing. "Mmm…"

"That settles it then." Max rubbed his hands together. "Tonight we shall raid their snug little houseboat for food, then make our daring getaway on an evil shar-"

"And sleep in the forest with the fire ants and animatronic moose?" I scratched at my scalp a second more, then searched my back pockets. "I don't think so. After a week and a half on this abhorrent island, I need a hot shower and a warm place to sleep."

"But you-"

"No 'buts', Max." My fingers closed around my blue comb. I pulled it out, flicked off an ant, and ran it through my hair. Snarls of red, mixed with (insect-free) dirt, leaves, and branches, tumbled over my shoulders. "I hadn't even reached the second stage of sleep when Chris woke us for midnight hide-and-seek. By my recollection that was six-point-two hours ago, and we had an entire challenge before that. Evil can at least wait for daybreak."

Or noon.

Or tomorrow.

"Fine." Max's grin drooped to a sulk. He folded his arms. "But first thing in the morning, we're throwing every one of those stinky bad people off the-"

"We?" The teeth of my comb nipped my skin. "There is no _we_!"

Max had been scowling in Topher's general direction, but when he heard my voice he turned his head without adjusting his facial expression by more than the twitch of a brow.

"Really now Scarlett, there is no need for temper tantrums. I already told you, I've forgiven you for that pathetic attempt at usurping me as your overlord and master. I've taken you back as my sidekick and even returned all your snackbar discount privileges as secretary and vice president of my evil lair. Honestly, what better treatment are you hoping to receive?"

"You just can't take a hint, can you?" I jabbed Max in the nose with the broken end of my comb. "I was _never_ your sidekick. And as long as you live, which, I might add, won't be much longer if you continue to bring it up, I will never _be_ your sidekick. In fact, if anyone is anyone's sidekick around here, it's you!"

I would have strangled Max then and there if not for the fact his neck was too thick to close my hands around. Believe me, I'd tried it once before.

"You would be _nothing_ if it weren't for me! Who fixed all your broken gadgets? Who came up with the plan to burst Sky's balloons? Who plucked the donkey from your lamb meat? Who had the idea to electrocute Team Maskwak? Who dragged you around when you were sick and vomiting? _Who picked thirty-eight ticks from your armpits and scalp when you were supposed to be on the other team_?"

"Well! I didn't know you felt that way."

"Then you're even more of a sap-headed imbecile than I thought you were. And to think I once thought you had potential to be more than a toilet brush cleaner for a small-town mall. If you were surrounded by a deck of scattered playing cards all turned face-up, you would _still_ lose a game of Solitaire. Why, if I'd flat-out made you my sidekick from the beginning rather than let you frolic about like a-"

I stopped. Not because Max cowered before me like a kicked chihuahua, but because Topher had returned to the houseboat's porch. He was shouting to us again, asking if we hadn't yet spotted him, if that was why we were ignoring him, and if we needed any help getting from the rocks to the shore.

I am a perfectly sane computer-programming psychologist-in-training with the second-highest math scores in the country for my age group, only-slightly-less-impressive chemistry grades, and fully-functional limbs. Tell me, does it look like I need help?

My stomach growled, and Max noticed. He took his hands from his face and wrapped them around his knees instead.

"Chicken sounds a lot better for the tummy than those icky Juggy Chugs."

I was tired. In the last twenty-four hours alone I had carried a baby through a field of lions and rattlesnakes, been buried alive by an avalanche, been unfrozen by interns throwing me in tepid water headfirst, tossed and turned before being jolted awake at midnight, swallowed a putrid glass of presumably expired meat and mayonnaise, dragged Max around the forest while suffering the effects of food-poisoning, carried him up a tree, been slammed in the head by Shawn's boots and fallen from said tree, suffered blasts in the face with a fire hose as Chef attempted to cure us of our food poisoning, infiltrated an advanced computer system, been fired from a cannon, fallen from a second tree, become closely acquainted with a few dozen fire ants who wanted to take up residence in my ferrets' nest of hair…

Lordy, did I ever want a shower. And a warm meal of something digestible. And a comfortable bed, where I could bury my head among the pillows and just _sleep_. If only it were possible to do all three at the same time. But alas, there were some problems that even I was at a loss to face, at least at this time of night. I didn't even care that sunrise was only minutes away. I'd sleep to noon and beyond if that's what it took to get my brain functioning again. With nothing to eat since Juggy Chugs, and some sparse nuts and berries before that, I'd been running purely on steam and glucose for days.

"Right. Here's what we're going to do." I took Max by the collar of his shirt and hoisted him up to his feet. "You and I are going to walk down to that houseboat. We are going to say 'Hello Topher, so good to see you again'."

Max made a face. "Eugh, must we?"

As if he'd heard the muttered words, Topher let out another cheerful, if slightly strained, plea for attention.

"Yes. After that we will get something to eat, and I am going to bed. With the exception of using the facilities, you are to stay in my sight at all times. You will not touch anything. You will not _do_ anything. And most importantly, you will not say _anything_ regarding the events of the past six hours. _That_ is how you can repay me for choosing to spare your life."

Max's eyes went wide as I released him. "You aren't going to tell them how you tried to kill us all with robots, usurp your master, blackmail Chris, and then destroy the entire island after he refused to hand you the one million dollars?"

" _No_."

"But why not? You were so _cool_!"

I froze mid-stroke, the teeth of my comb snagged in my hair.

"No, no, it's all the truth!" Max hopped onto a taller rock to act out his story. "There I was, locked on one side of that awful shocky passcode door with Jasmine, the one-man zombie freakshow, the girl who does the flips, and the foul-smelling one who brays like a sickly donkey. What with your threat to blow us all up, you had every one of them cowering at your feet like tiny flightless insects with their itty bitty wings torn off. Even me, and I knew you weren't seriously intending to go through with it, _obviously_. Nonetheless, it was your crowning moment in villainy!" Max sniffled and wiped a tear from his eye with a bloodied fist. "I taught you so well."

I… let that last comment pass.

"Right. Sure. Let's go with that." I was still without my glasses, but I kept a spare scrunchie on me at all times. Taming my hair was half the look in itself. Three twists, a tuck, and it was done.

"Oh," Max said, blinking.

"What?"

"Nothing. It's just that you look so diff… Nothing."

"Good. And I expect you will continue saying nothing until I tell you otherwise. Now let's go before that lunkhead down there brings every moose and hungry wolf in the forest on top of us."

When Topher greeted us outside the houseboat, his smile was so plastic I half expected it to shatter when he straightened up.

"Hey, Max! Scarlett! _Loving_ the commando-glasses look, by the way. It just seems so… _You_. Wow. Max, buddy, you're looking well. Both of you, looking extremely well. Exactly what do we have here?" He elbowed Max in the shoulder hard enough to send the smaller teen stumbling. "Way to get your girl to sacrifice the game for the sake of sticking with you, am I right or aren't I?"

I snapped my head back out of instinct, lifting one hand halfway towards my face. In all honesty, it was Max who came quicker to the punch. He said, "Greetings, Bubblehead. So good to see you again," and disappeared behind the insect curtain with a flick of one hand.

"And it would seem that Max isn't much of a morning person. So, Scarlett-"

"Good night, Topher," I said, and followed Max. I didn't have to go far. He'd made his way through the single corridor to the kitchen, and stopped dead in the hall.

"But- the chicken- where? I swear, just a moment ago I smelled-"

Lemon juice, and granite countertops that glittered with clean.

"Foul trick," grumbled Max.

"Never mind," I said, throwing open the nearest cabinet. "We'll have access to a full-course dinner tomorrow. Tonight, rather. Here, you adolescent males just _love_ these saturated foods. Catch."

Max didn't catch the Ruffles, nor did he catch the Doritos or the Hickory Sticks or the Lays. With an incoherent mutter, he wandered out to the back porch, where the hot wind stirred the air enough to offer more relief than the puttering A/C inside. As he slipped out the door, I fired another packet at his back just to spite him.

"He should consider working to improve his hand-eye coordination better than that of a one-legged sugar glider," said a nasal-high voice from behind me. I snatched an avocado from the fruit bowl and whipped around before he even finished the sentence. "Though I'm not sure I would call it a flaw in his reaction skills so much as a weak point in your accuracy stat, Scarlett."

Once I realized it was him standing there and not someone who could be classified as a threat, I slowly put the fruit back on the counter.

"Thank you, Leonard. I'll be sure to keep that in mind."

He stood in the doorway of the nearest bedroom, outfitted in that ridiculous green wizard's robe that went down to his feet, and he rubbed a long twig thoughtfully against his chin.

"I'd be happy to give you some pointers, if you like. The rate of experience gained would increase dramatically under the light of the full moon. And with you yet to reach the second level - we call it boosting in my business, see - you would quickly-"

" _Thank you_ , Leonard." I plucked up my avocado again, shook off a few of the more ambitious fruit-flies, and headed for the bathroom. I didn't need to glance in the mirror to know that, despite my earlier preening, I still looked like a wreck. I probably smelled of lake water and vomit too.

"The door doesn't lock," Leonard told me helpfully when I shut it in his face. "I'll stand guard out here for you. And this time, none shall pass. Not like the other day when the Geminis wanted to do their hair at the same time and Rodney was-"

I turned the shower strength to high, just to tune him out. The water was refreshing. More importantly, it was _clean_. It pooled in my hands and ran in rivets down my arms, soaking my sweater sleeves. No matter- I'd need to put it on again when I was finished anyway. The beautiful liquid smelled like the rainforest. It was warm, almost unpleasantly so, and sent tingles down my many ant bites. Seventy-eight on my legs and sixteen more on my arms, to be exact.

Leonard rapped on the door. "Is it because you aren't wearing your glasses?"

I cut back on the flow of water. "What?"

"Your first three shots on Max missed by a meter, and he hadn't even put up a forcefield. So I was wondering, was it because you aren't wearing your glasses?"

"It is true that I have approximately 20/200 vision. That, coupled with the fact that I wasn't trying nearly as hard to hit him as I might have been had I been holding a weapon of higher mass than a 1.5-ounce bag of snack food, should be more than enough to provide you with an answer."

"Oh." There was a pause. I'd only just turned the water back up when Leonard knocked again. "So like, what's been happening out there on the island? No one's succeeded in getting Dave to say yet, plus he went down to sleep like he'd drinken a barrel of mermaid's milk all by himself. Then there's Topher, and I wouldn't put a wager on him any more than I'd trust a first-rolled cleric."

Ribbons of soap caught beneath my nails.

"Extremely complicated challenge blather that would take until high noon to cover in full," I said back. "I doubt you would understand."

Leonard stayed quiet for almost a full two minutes before he piped up again. "I think it's really cool how you and Max got eliminated together. Topher said you two were tight. So is he like your-?"

"He _isn't_ my boyfriend!" Nausea rose in my stomach at the very thought. It was the Juggy Chugs all over again. I shivered, hard, despite the steam that had fogged up my surroundings. "In fact, he isn't my _anything_! You can rest assured, I would be quite happy if he would remain that way for the short remainder of his eternity! And before you bring up the question, No, I am most certainly not interested in forming a relationship with a freckle-faced adolescent who spends the day running amok in a dress, brandishing twigs and spouting gibberish and expecting to form something out of nothing, when Newton's third law of motion clearly states, 'For every action there is an _equal and opposite reaction'!_ "

"Okay, geez. Wow. I was going to say 'tank'. Roll a chill check, sister. I was just saying that what with the brawn and brains thing going on, the two of you must make an excellently-balanced team. If you ever require the assistance of a wizard, I would be more than happy to offer my services."

Phenomenal. And now he's asking for a threesome in the relationship that doesn't even exist. I hate my life.

Leonard knocked again. "Scarlett?"

This time I ignored him, and let the water pour down my skin like the first rain of spring.

It seemed I had offended our resident wizard, because he was gone when I stepped outside the bathroom, tucked back into my wet cardigan, my hair tied up in a bun, a blue-gray towel wrapped around my shoulders. I wasn't sorry for the loss.

The kitchen bustled with activity. Rodney and Beardo took turns squeezing oranges into fat pitchers, competing over who could hold the most fruit at once. When I squinted I spotted Sammy gutting a potato with intent to kill on the couch. Dave sat beside her as a human meat shield to divide her from Amy… who was also peeling potatoes with a knife. Judging from the look on Dave's face, this had only just occurred to him.

Back by the porch windows, Ella called to a flock of pink birds who (I'm not making this up) deposited various fruits and berries into her basket before soaring away in a flutter of wings. Even Topher had come to contribute, if you count twisting yourself into various poses while simultaneously balancing stacks of pancakes on your head a positive contribution to the breakfast experience.

But despite my whining stomach, I didn't eat any of the pancakes. Instead, I turned down the hall and pushed through the first door on the left. Shoes and more than three pairs of socks had been thrown haphazardly about the room. The sheets were rumpled, freshly used. The place was a disaster. A living nightmare for those who needed to keep things organized or run the risk of going insane.

I didn't even care. I was out like a snuffed candle before my head came within an inch of the pillow.

It was late when I woke, still dripping with exhaustion. Noon at the least, if the sunlight coursing through the windows was any indication.

And the _heat_. My skin simmered beneath my sweater. I scratched my arms, almost considering it, but with all the hormones flying through the air and no fresh clothes to change into… No, better to broil.

"Good morning, Red. Did you sleep well? In my bed?"

I should have known it when I saw the blonde hair on the sheets. If not that, then the cheerleading socks should have been a dead giveaway.

I propped myself up on my elbows, groaning softly, and spat out a curl of hair that had popped loose from my careful bun. "Not quite, unfortunately. My circadian rhythm has been skewed for the past two days. Added to that, even post my kicking the comforter to the floor, my body temperature did not decrease and balance out at 20° Celsius, the optimal temperature for remaining asleep." I flexed my fingers. "But, during my brain's biological nighttime, my cognitive and motor skills had begun to slip. I am pleased to report that I am feeling much better now than I did prior to my nap."

Amy blinked. She perched on the foot of the bed with both legs and arms crossed. She held a vial of nail polish, though it wasn't open. From the dash of green across the dorsal of her foot, I figured she'd been painting it on when she had noticed me stirring, and had hurried to settle in a position she expected I would find unnerving when I awoke.

"Well," she said at last, squaring her shoulders, "While it was, um… _uncouth_ of you to sleep in my bed without permission, you do make a better bunkmate than Samey. At least you don't thrash around and snore." She tapped the polish brush against her cheek, turning her gaze upwards. "Come to think of it, it'll be nice to have another girl around to talk to. One who is actually, you know, sane."

"Right. Thank you, Amy."

"At least you had some breathing room back on the island with these dorks around." From her pocket she produced her phone and tapped out a rapid message with her thumb. Electronic devices were contraband on the island, but I wasn't surprised in the least to see Amy had one. Knowing her, she'd probably snuck it in through her sister's hair. "I've been stuck here with the wizard, the princess, the puppet guy - who, by the way, I would suggest _not talking_ to, since once he hears your voice he-"

I stood to find the floor gently swaying beneath my feet. We were moving. I stared out the window as our boat chugged softly past a row of aspens to our port side, then a row of umbrella thorns directly after.

We were still within range of Pahkitew Island. What a nightmare.

Amy was just rounding off her list as I moved to the door. "The crybaby from the other team, that grumbling farmboy with the red hair-"

"Your room is a haven for porcine," I told her, flipping one sock into the air with my foot.

"Don't blame me, blame Samey. Our room back home always looks like this. I always tell her to put things back where they belong, but she won't stop pretending she forgets. But now that she's bunking with the fairy princess since Mumbles moved out of his room to sleep on the couch, I don't have to even _see_ her any more for the rest of the summer."

Amy must have realized then that I had left, for she hopped from her bed and ran to follow. Her nails closed over my forearm, pinching ant bites through my sleeve. "Hey," I spluttered, trying to jerk it back, but she clung on like a parakeet.

" _Please_ be my new roommate, Scarlett! Please! If you don't, I'll end up with the giant girl, or the fat one with the blonde hair, or that weird girl from the other team that does the flips. Or was she on our team? I forget. _You can't leave me like this_!"

I pushed on her cheek, trying to detach her, but Amy was a lot more stubborn than her twin and as fierce as an adolescent tiger, and she definitely couldn't take a hint.

I sighed.

"You said Rodney's laid claim to the couch already? … I suppose anything would be preferable to sleeping on the floor."

Amy blinked. "What?" she said first, then let go of my arm. "You will? Really? Ha!" She grinned. "Just wait 'til I tell Samey that I've got you now. No way will anyone dare to dump lake water in my bed as long as you're there." She ran off for the front deck, calling her sister's name.

Great.

Speaking of sleeping on the floor, I encountered someone doing just that. Because I had been concentrating on my stomach and watching Amy run the opposite direction, I didn't see him. My foot caught beneath his arm. I tripped, and Max made a noise like a squeaky toy when I fell on top of him.

"Augh," he whined, rubbing his elbow. "Really now, there is no need for being violent."

"Max, what the- Why would you sprawl yourself in the middle of the hall?"

His hair was flowing, I realized, and a second later I saw why. "Because of this," Max said. He pointed to a portable air conditioner set humming against the wall. "That, and this tile floor that retains the cold. It was much too hot up on the deck for sleeping this morning. Too noisy too."

He sat up, brushing dust from his hair. "The pointy-haired one wouldn't leave me alone until I hooked his laptop up to WiFi, and now they're all fighting over it like starving piranhas on a tour boat in the Amazon at dinnertime for fish who eat people."

"You hooked Topher's laptop up to WiFi?" I stopped scratching my knee to squint at him. "Here, on a moving boat? But even with a working router you would need a modem in order to… Unless you found a way to redirect the waves…"

Then I grimaced. "You hacked into the main computer grid. Oh, now that's clever. But how is it that he managed to smuggle in a laptop when our luggage was supposed to have been destroyed in the zeppelin crash?"

Max shrugged, pressed on his back until his spine made a cracking noise, and wandered over to the kitchen table. "I don't ask questions of people who smell like feet post their third shower of the day."

"No, but apparently you go out of your way to fix their trivial problems. No matter what angle you try to pass it off as, you wouldn't persuade even Ella that you're doing evil." I folded my arms. "Much more of that and they'll leech off you and your precocious skills until you switch towns and recreate your entire identity. And even then, not everyone will take a hint."

Max wilted. "It can be hard to do evil when your middle name is Magnanimous."

He thought he had it rough? Try staying upset with someone who can turn his blood phosphorescent cerulean.

"The fool promised I could have a turn, but with so many maggots kissing up to him now he's probably forgotten about me. No matter. I was able to switch the battery when he wasn't looking and use it to make _this_."

I squinted. "It looks like you duct-taped half a flashlight to a Super Soaker."

"That's because it is a Super Soaker. Or it used to be, but now it is my evil ray gun. I constructed it out of the bug zapper on the porch and a water pistol that the wizard no longer possesses."

Judging from the smell, the sink of dirty water, and meat-splattered microwave, I had missed a lunch of burritos. While I searched the cupboards for dishes, Max ran over to show me his invention up close.

"You see, using these humming fan blades in the chamber here, it simulates the mating call of a female mosquito, thereby attracting the blood-sucking males inside where they can be amassed into a tiny army of flesh-eating insects! _Mwahahaha_!"

"It's a brilliant idea," I said, "except for the fact that only the females drink human blood. The males feed on flower nectar and pollinate grapes." I frowned into an empty box of Shreddies that had been left on its shelf. "If you really want to attract the females, consider building something that produces carbon dioxide. The family _culicidae_ have evolved keen senses that allow them to easily discern the location of such a source. Then attract the males, add a pool of water where they can lay their eggs, and presto. You can breed them within a contained space."

"Breeding them was Ella's original plan," Max admitted, "but I sort of took the idea and ran with it because I really, really wanted to take apart that bug-zapper."

"You let the pasty-faced princess who screams in chromatic scale push you around like that?" I poured myself a tall glass of milk, then left the carton on the sunny counter where it would spoil.

" _Obviously_ I had ulterior motives of my own, fool. And that isn't the end of what it can do." Max got up to put the milk back in the fridge. "Aside from releasing the breeding chamber all at once, I can use this propelling mechanism here to fire small doses of the insects at will. Imagine, a seemingly infinite amount of mosquitoes bursting from people's undies, zipping from the fridge, crawling in their hair! _Bwahahahaha!_ Hahahaha! Mwahahaha!"

My fingernails left half-moon indents in the cabinet door. "Now that's a bit more like it."

"Why Scarlett, you flatter me." Max bowed with a flutter of his hand. "But I have more. You see what I have here? I built _this_ for the boat-overthrowing scheme we'll be putting into action tonight. Take a good, long look."

"At what, that broken watering can with kittens and flowers painted on it?"

"Firstly, yes that watering can. Do you see many other watering cans about? And secondly, they aren't kittens, but rather vicious jaguars that can tear you apart with one glance. The artist just messed up on their size." He stroked his thumb along the dirty plastic. "I have mixed a special formula that, when sprinkled with the utmost care, can bring plants to life! Tonight when those fools are up to their necks in water, seaweed will wrap around their ankles and pull them under where they will be unable to breathe!"

Max laughed again, then stopped and regarded the watering can with disappointment. "Unfortunately, I've learned it's difficult to apply my formula to plants that are already underwater." He shrugged and pushed it away when I joined him at the table with my milk. "What sorts of evil inventions have you made so far, Scarlett?"

Um.

"Well, I haven't actually worked out any evil schemes since our arrival… But I _have_ caught up on my sleep in order to ensure my mind is working at its full capabilities. I continued to preserve my identity as a neat-freak nerd by exaggerating my care for hygiene. I also frustrated Amy to no end by preventing her from taking a nap in her own bed. And I offended Leonard."

He looked at me, so unimpressed that I could practically see the emotion ooze down his face to the floor. I curled in my toes.

I turned away, back towards the cupboards. A fresh wave of itching washed over my ant bites. "I may have yet to scrape together an animatronic or two, but that's only because I'm in no rush to do so. Tonight is the earliest Chris will eliminate another of his precious contestants who could leak undesirable information to the others. Tomorrow, even, depending on how long it takes them all to stabilize the island."

I slammed a cabinet door. Honestly, even with this amount of pubescent children onboard, there had to be some uneaten crumbs about somewhere. "We've only just arrived here, and I stand by my prioritizing the rejuvenation of my neuron pathways before playing the plotting game. We still have plenty of time to evil."

Max jerked back, his chair scraping across the floor.

" _Opportunity_ for evil," I corrected, yanking open the final drawer in the row. "The syntax there was simply a force of- _Yes_!" I grabbed the package and thrust it above my head as I spun around. My luck was finally starting to turn.

"Prepare to quake in fear, vermin! With these in my possession, I will be the sole adolescent on this boat with a reliable source of thiamin, folate, and vitamins B6, E, and B3. The potassium within will sharpen my brain and nerve functions with a single bite. You may as well save yourselves from embarrassment and call me Queen of Spades right now."

Max stared at me, his mouth agape. "But Scarlett, you can't eat cookies yet. You haven't even had breakfast!"

"Peanut butter contains biotin and soy, as well as traces of a stilbenoid called resveratrol which, aside from increasing the flow of blood to your brain by up to thirty-five percent, makes it an excellent example of the French paradox. Between the protein and antioxidants it provides, it could practically be classified as an entire meal in among itself."

The flimsy plastic bag tore beneath my fingernails. "Studies also suggest that consuming peanut butter more than two times a week significantly lowers the risk of colon cancer in females. In the face of someone with the potential to go into anaphylactic shock, it becomes a deadly weapon you can carry with you anywhere without attracting the attention of local authorities." I popped a cookie in my mouth and closed my eyes, turning it this way and that with my tongue. "And if that weren't enough, it also happens to be most delicious substance on the entire face of the planet."

"But- breakfast! Mother says-"

I tossed him half a cookie, which he caught in a fumble of fingers, and hopped onto the counter. "Mommy isn't here now, is she? Come on Max, learn to live a little. You don't need to take your marching orders from her anymore. Unless, of course, you aren't nearly as much of a villain as you claim to be."

"What?" A tight twitch of his fingers and my cookie was crumbles. "That's preposterous! I have just as much right to call myself evil as you do!"

"Fine then." I pulled my leg onto the counter beside me, crunching on another cookie. "If that's what you really want to believe."

Max was fuming now, on his feet with his shoulders trembling beside his ears, a single finger jabbing at the air. "You'll see! I come from a long line of brilliant inventors. I'll show you all the EVIL blood that courses through my veins! From now on, I make my own plans. I take orders from no one. Including you, _Scarlett_!"

"Toss me the mosquito gun," I said, and he did.


End file.
